


Dragonfire Coda: The Guided Tour

by DBC_82



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Classic Who Companions Are Awesome, Serial: s147 Dragonfire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:06:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27290170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DBC_82/pseuds/DBC_82
Summary: The first in a series of short stories featuring the Seventh Doctor and Ace in the moment or hours after their televised adventures have ended; 'The Guided Tour' finds the Doctor helping Ace explore her new home, while discussing their experiences on Iceworld and considering their future together...
Relationships: Seventh Doctor & Ace McShane
Comments: 3
Kudos: 10





	Dragonfire Coda: The Guided Tour

The Doctor’s fingers danced a complex pattern across the hexagonal console that occupied the centre of the room while his other hand pulled a lever. From somewhere both far away and close by Ace heard the sound of ancient engines grinding into life. The room gave an almost imperceptible lurch as they took off, though she wasn’t even sure how the strange blue box travelled. The outside had said Police, though the Doctor didn’t look like any kind of policeman she’d ever met.

'Well that’s the formalities out of the way. What next, hmm?'

Ace shrugged and then immediately winced as she heard the telltale clink of aerosol cans knocking together from within her backpack. The Doctor turned his attention away from the console and fixed her with a steely gaze.

'Perhaps I should add a fourth rule to the list about high explosives….'

Ace stared back for as long as she dared to, before her nerve failed and she turned away.

'So what’s this thing called again?' she asked finally, gesturing vaguely at the room around them. 'Donut said something about the trar-dis?'

'TARDIS,' the Doctor scolded, 'It’s been my home for many years and now it’s yours as well.' His face broke into an impish grin, 'Oh but of course! I would be remiss in my duties as captain, custodian and co-conspirator if I weren't to at least extend some common courtesy to those who choose to come travelling with me.'

'Come again?'

The Doctor smiled disarmingly, 'It’s time for the guided tour.'

******

Ace wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting from the Doctor’s ship but a series of bright white corridors certainly wasn’t it. And what was with all the round things on the walls? It didn’t look like any kind of spaceship Ace had ever encountered before, even in her limited experience. When she’d asked how it worked the Doctor had said something about relative dimensions, block transfer computation and an eye of harmony, whatever that was when it was at home. All she was really sure of was that it was bigger on the inside than the outside and it travelled in space and time.

Ace got the impression the Doctor enjoyed acting like the teacher, though she secretly suspected he was as much trouble as she was. That was fine. That she could relate to, not like the teachers back in Perivale. ‘Don’t run, don’t fight, don’t talk back.’ Ace smiled to herself, if they could see me now she thought. Weird Dorry, out amongst the stars. Always said I was gonna be an astronaut. Take that Mum.

The Doctor stopped walking and she realised he was studying her, the ghost of a smile playing on his mouth. He opened an otherwise featureless white door. 'This is your room, if that's alright with you. I'm sure you’ll find you have enough space.'

Ace frowned, it was almost as though the Doctor had known what she was thinking. Before she could consider the puzzling little man in front of her any further she realised something unexpected about her new bedroom.

'Hang about, those are my things!' she gesticulated at the room at large. In amongst the solid wooden furniture were her ghetto blaster, her baseball bat and several bags of dirty laundry lying in an untidy pile next to a large wardrobe. There were even a couple of the frayed posters she’d put up in her quarters on Iceworld, now obscuring the round things on the wall above the large and comfy looking wrought iron bed.

'I thought some familiarities might make you feel more at home.'

Ace shrugged and decided to file that away under M for magic.

The Doctor smiled at her. 'Not quite'

'I don't understand, how did my things end up here?'

'Perhaps the TARDIS has taken a shine to you. She can be a fickle mistress when she wants to so be grateful you’re in her good graces.'

******

The tour continued. Ace found herself wandering down identical corridors, seemingly at random, and as they walked they’d talked of their experiences on Svartos.

'I knew Kane’s plan was thwarted from the moment I consulted the star charts on the TARDIS. From that point it was only a case of making sure he didn’t harm anyone. Sadly I hadn't reckoned with his more overt homicidal tendencies.'

'I get the impression you explaining things is going to be a substantial part of our friendship.'

The Doctor stopped so suddenly and turned to face her that Ace very nearly walked into him. 'Are we friends?' he asked innocently.

Ace frowned at the unexpected question as the Doctor studied her intently. 'Yeah, well, I mean… I hope so.'

'Oh…. Good. This way now, hurry up, don’t dawdle.'

Ace laughed in surprise at the sudden change in his manner, if the Doctor had been carrying his umbrella she imagined he’d be holding it aloft like a tour guide. Yet when he’d asked her whether they were friends or not she’d seen a flash of something deeper, something vulnerable but also calculating.

'So if you knew that Prome… Proa…'

'Proamon.'

'Right. If you knew Proamon was star dust, did you also know Kane was gonna flip and go all Raiders of the Lost Ark?'

'Raiders of the what?'

'Well he melted, reminded me of a film I saw once. Indiana Jones?'

The Doctor frowned, 'Your cultural references are going to take some getting used to. I may have to update the TARDIS translation circuits.'

Five minutes in your company and I nearly got freeze-dried by an evil Captain Birdseye, Ace thought. There's probably quite a few things that'll take some getting used to.

'To answer your question,' the Doctor said. 'No, I didn’t know. I abhor death in all its many and varied forms.'

'Too right.'

Ace stopped walking as she thought of the circumstances of their meeting. People had died, a good many people had died and they’d just flown off ready for the next adventure. Though she didn't like to admit it there’d also been a moment when she’d nearly given in… Normally Ace would have stuffed that thought deep down to be dealt with later but the Doctor seemed like the kind of person she could talk to honestly so instead of saying nothing she took a deep breath.

'I nearly took his coin, you know,' she said quietly.

The Doctor stopped walking and turned to face her, his expression inscrutable. Without meeting his eye, she continued speaking.

'I just thought... what choice have I got? My whole life I was waiting to get out, to get away. Somewhere, anywhere! Perivale was a dump right, and then this light show whips up like something out of a bad music video…'

'Time storm.'

'If you say so. Didn’t even know time had weather, that’s another one Michael Fish didn’t see coming.'

The Doctor smiled sadly and Ace continued, it seemed important to finish now she’d started. 'Anyway, I ended up stuck on Iceworld, the freezer capital arse end of nowhere and I was trapped again. Only this time I really had nothing. No money, no friends, nowhere to escape to. So I wound up being a waitress again, because it was all I knew how to do.'

Ace ran out of things to say and didn’t feel like explaining herself any more. Apparently the Doctor understood as without speaking he took her hand in his and looked her deep in the eye.

'You’re not trapped any more.'

Ace smiled at the fire that danced in his eyes.

******

The rest of their walk around the bewildering complex space-time vessel known as the TARDIS took in the gymnasium, the swimming pool and the bathroom (which Ace decided looked practically indistinguishable from the swimming pool except for the neglected looking rubber ducks floating in the middle). After that came the vast library, the laboratory (which was definitely worth revisiting), the arboretum, the cloisters and the picture gallery, which contained a multitude of paintings but had the low level background hum of a power station. Finally they reached a junction in the endless series of corridors and the Doctor through out his arms theatrically.

'There. Now you know your way around. Though I wouldn’t ever rely on any room residing in the same location twice.'

'You what?'

'The TARDIS is sentient, alive in a sense. The interior has a habit of reordering itself from time to time.'

'Is the fickle mistress fond of a bit of restructuring to keep her mind occupied?'

'Well I imagine all my tedious toing and froing gets a little tiresome after a couple of millennia, and she is mildly telepathic after all'

'I’ll bear that in mind. Pun intended.'

As they stood in the middle of a veritable labyrinth Ace’s stomach started to rumble. There'd been no sign of a kitchen on their travels and Iceworld staff rations had been meagre at best. If the TARDIS really could go anywhere in the universe Ace thought that maybe they could stop off somewhere for a bacon sandwich. If they even had bacon in space, she thought.

As if sensing her thoughts again the Doctor led them to an adjacent doorway that he described as the Observatory.It was a large but dimly lit room festooned with comfy chairs, beanbags, cushions and pillows, as well as the occasional table complete with bejeweled Tiffany lamps. The dark recessed corners of the octagonal room contained vaulted columns; Ace craned her neck upwards and saw that they reached up to a vast panorama of stars, nebulas and galaxies twinkling above them instead of a ceiling. Ace got comfy and stared contentedly at the heavens above her while the Doctor disappeared momentarily only to return with two mugs of steaming hot cocoa. Ace took the proffered mug gratefully and leaned back into her overstuffed but comfortable fuchsia armchair.

'So what do you do for fun when you’re not saving the universe Professor?'

'Doctor!' he said crossly before smiling. 'I travel mostly. That’s all I am really, a simple traveller.'

Pull the other one, thought Ace with a grin.

The Doctor seemed to sense her doubt, blew on his cocoa and continued. 'I help out where I can, if I can. The web of time is… fragile.'

'So you can go anywhere?'

'Anywhere, anywhen, anyhow, anywhy.'

'In that case I’ve just had a great idea.'

The Doctor’s face darkened. 'I should warn you though, there are rules. If you choose to step into history, you cannot change a thing nor alter your past in any way. Mistakes we've made must remain made and those we’ve lost must stay lost...'

'Yeah but can I go to a gig?'

The Doctor looked appalled. 'A gig!?'

'Only before I went walkabout I had these tickets to Brixton Academy. I had it all worked out, I was going to tell mum I was staying at my mate Shreela’s and she was going to do the same...'

'I offer you all of time and space on a platter and you want to go see a band?'

'Not just any band Professor, the Stone Roses!'

The Doctor laughed despite himself. 'Perhaps, perhaps, but not right now. We have work to do you and I.'

'What kind of work?'

'The kind that I’ve been putting off for far too long.'

'Sounds ominous.'

“It should.”

Ace sipped her cocoa and considered the Doctor’s statement. 'But we sorted that Kane bloke easy. With me watching your back the creeps have got no chance.'

The Doctor stared off into the distance and Ace’s smile faltered. After a moment of silence the Doctor spoke again.

'Kane was a hard man, cruel and burdened with tragedy and so very far away from home, though there are creatures out there that would make even him afraid. The universe has bred some dark terrors, creatures of rage, chaos and fire, and oh so calculating in their cruelty. They must be fought.'

Ace pondered the Doctor’s words. 'Thing is professor, I reckon we already make a pretty good team, there’s no standing in the way of that. And, well…'

'Yes?' the Doctor said looking over at her from a beanbag.

'For everything else there’s the baseball bat.'

******

The Doctor smiled as he looked across into the earnest brown eyes of his latest friend. How many had people had put their trust in him, only to end up lost or dead or so far away from home? Even those who'd returned to the time from which they'd left had come home unutterably changed. And now he'd found her at last just as he'd known he always would and she hadn't even been given a choice, cast into his path like a die rolled in a casino.

He’d known. Of course he’d known, how could he not?

From the moment she’d stood in front of him, so full of attitude and vulnerability he’d seen his future unfolding in front of him like a lotus flower. That she could understand the speech of the Iceworld patrons so unquestioningly had been his first warning sign, though whether that was down to Fenric's machinations or the TARDIS's retroactive benevolence he'd never be able to tell. All he did know was that there was no time left to play the jester, to caper and clown for the universe’s amusement. It was time to face up to his responsibilities. It was time to put all the plots and schemes into action that he'd tucked away in the dark corners of his mind for so long.

Omega. Nemesis. Ragnarok. Fenric.

He’d known this day would come and Ace’s arrival only confirmed it. Of course he’d miss Melanie, with her earnest optimism and boundless enthusiasm, just as he missed all his friends when they eventually moved on but it was time to put away childish things.

He glanced away from the young woman in front of him to better see into the past. How long had it been since he’d sat in the dust with Fenric, smiling amiably as he'd condemned it to an aeon in the shadows? Or the fateful day that he'd launched the Nemesis into a degrading orbit and doomed Lady Peinforte to a lifetime of futile plots and impotent rage. He’d been younger then but so much older as well. Had he known what he'd started, what wheels had been set in motion? How those victories created a chain of events that would shape not only his future but also see untold strangers die broken and all because of his hubris.

His only chance was to try and change Ace's destiny, turn her from Fenric's pawn into her own person. He glanced at the young woman sat across from him as she sipped her drink and stared contentedly up at the vista of stars displayed across the holographic ceiling. What was she to him; woman or weapon. What was she thinking?

He could take a look of course, not that telepathy was ever really necessary when it came to teenagers. But no, he decided, better to take the long way round. To get to know this intelligent, angry, complicated young woman, to show her the universe and show her herself. Keep her alive and out of danger long enough to build a trust and a friendship that would become the stuff of legend in years to come.

If only to tear it down in one final act of betrayal.


End file.
